Shentucar original
Author | dawn
Edit | Wei Jia
Mercedes-Benz and BMW have always been rivals in love with each other.
They are the world's best-selling luxury car brands, the same Ashkenazi top three (the other is Audi), even the brand initials are the same, the two "Bs" in the BBA are also confusing, and many people have been confused about who is in front.
In terms of products, they are also highly overlapping. In addition to the Mercedes-Benz brand and the BMW brand, in the ultra-luxury market, the Mercedes-Benz parent company has Maybach, BMW has Rolls-Royce; in the small car market, Mercedes-Benz has Smart, BMW has MINI.
In terms of sales, BMW was higher many years ago, followed by Mercedes-Benz, but since 2016, Mercedes-Benz's global sales have surpassed BMW, and then maintained this advantage for five years.
However, in 2021, BMW once again surpassed Mercedes-Benz and returned to the global luxury car sales championship. Victory is back on BMW's side again.
This may be just a coincidence, or it may be a turning point.
In early February, Mercedes-Benz was fined 20.2 billion won by South Korea's antitrust regulator for false advertising, and a few days later, Mercedes-Benz Auto Finance was notified by the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission that there were four violations of the legitimate rights and interests of consumers.
In terms of sales and public opinion, Mercedes-Benz has begun to fall behind. In 2022, can Mercedes-Benz still play BMW?
Being overtaken by BMW, what happened to Mercedes-Benz?
Compared with BMW, Mercedes-Benz's sales in 2021 can be said to be a complete rout.
Global new car sales (both passenger and commercial vehicles) were 2.4 million units, outpacing BMW (including bmw, MINI and Rolls-Royce) by 2.52 million. This is the first time in the past five years that Mercedes-Benz has been overtaken by BMW, losing the champion of luxury car sales.
Looking at only a single brand, Mercedes-Benz also lags behind BMW. The Mercedes-Benz brand sold 2.09 million units worldwide, while the BMW brand sold 2.21 million units.
Looking at the Chinese market, BMW is still a champion. Mercedes-Benz sold 759,000 units in 2021, down 2% year-on-year, while BMW sold 846,000 units, up 8.9% year-on-year. BMW is the only brand in the BBA that is growing positively.
In the past five years, Mercedes-Benz has occasionally sold less than BMW in the Chinese market, but it is the first time that BMW has been completely surpassed by BMW from the above three dimensions.
Mercedes-Benz's sales decline, on the one hand, are affected by the shortage of global chip supply. However, this is a common problem faced by all car companies, why BMW has not been greatly affected, it is worth Mercedes-Benz reflection.
Product strength is another important factor.
Over the past few years, the main products of Mercedes-Benz and BMW have been inseparable. The sales pillars of Mercedes-Benz in China are Mercedes-Benz C-Class, E-Class, GLC, BMW is BMW 3 Series, 5 Series and X3, which compete comprehensively in multiple dimensions such as product, price and brand. But in 2021, Mercedes-Benz is not as good as BMW.
In the 2021 car retail sales ranking released by the Association, Mercedes-Benz did not have a car on the list, but the BMW 5 Series and BMW 3 Series were on the list. On the SUV list, the BMW X3 was on the list, and mercedes-Benz was not on the list. In the high-end car sales list, bmw 5 series and BMW 3 series ranked first and second respectively, and Mercedes-Benz E-class and Mercedes-Benz C-class ranked fourth and fifth.
BMW is surpassing Mercedes-Benz and becoming more and more popular with Chinese consumers.
The experience of the slag yang who just bought a car last year may be representative. She told Shentu that in March last year, she focused on comparing the Mercedes-Benz GRC and BMW X3, and when she test drove the Mercedes-Benz GLC, she felt that the suspension was relatively poor, and when she saw the Internet, she said that the brakes might have a different sound, so she gave up decisively and chose BMW.
Beijing's Jianxiang replaced his Ford Impreza with a Mercedes-Benz GLB last year, and then found that the brand was upgraded and the driving experience declined. The most obvious is the noise. He told Shentu that the engine of the Mercedes-Benz GLB is very noisy, and many car owners have reflected it. Shentu found that on Taobao, there are even merchants selling Mercedes-Benz GLLB-specific door sealing and sound insulation strips.
In addition, the four-sided collision warning of Mercedes-Benz GLB is not easy to use. According to Jian Xiang, sometimes it is not sensitive, sometimes it is too sensitive, and it is difficult to adjust to the right level.
"After driving a Mercedes-Benz, I feel that it is just like this, that is, the brand is good, and the money is spent on the brand." He said.
BMW to sell, Mercedes-Benz to luxury?
The most valuable thing about Mercedes-Benz should be its brand, especially in the high-priced luxury car market.
In stark contrast to the overall decline in sales, Mercedes-Benz's sales in the ultra-luxury market increased significantly in 2021.
For example, the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, which costs more than a million, sold 87,000 units last year, an increase of 40% year-on-year, of which 35.5% of sales came from China; the more expensive Mercedes-Benz G-Class, which sold a record 41,000 units; and the ultra-luxury sub-brand Maybach, which also sold 15,730 units last year. It is reported that in recent years, Maybach's sales in the Chinese market have accounted for 70% of its global sales.
In the ultra-luxury market, Mercedes-Benz is still extremely competitive. There is a saying that in 2021, the supply of chips is tight, and Mercedes-Benz has given priority to high-end models with a limited supply of chips.
The question is, will the luxury route that Mercedes-Benz used to be good at work on work in the future?
"I don't know much about the luxurious interior of Mercedes," it always feels like a nightclub." Some car owners commented on this.
Source / @Mercedes-Benz
"I have to admit that the interior of the Mercedes is better than the BMW, but I also think tesla's minimalism is also very good, and I may be more inclined to buy a Tesla for the next car." A Mercedes-Benz owner said to Deepway.
Now young people's definition of luxury is changing. Especially after the rise of the new car-making forces represented by Tesla, the so-called luxury elements such as design, workmanship, leather materials, and metal decoration that Mercedes-Benz was best at in the past were no longer the only choice for luxury.
Mercedes-Benz is still defining luxury by the standards of the past.
At the Munich Motor Show 2021, Mercedes-Benz released a Maybach version of EQS, which can be called the trump card of Mercedes-Benz pure electric products. Mercedes-Benz said the interior design of the Maybach EQS SUV is still inspired by the yacht, white piano paint, rose gold decoration, artificial fur covered floor, to achieve "elegance, nobility". At the end of the day, it's about the interior and design.
In another indicator that defines luxury - mechanical performance, Mercedes-Benz has not improved much in recent years, and strictly speaking, all fuel vehicles have not fundamentally changed. This is determined by the innate bottleneck of the internal combustion engine. Now electric vehicles, in terms of horsepower, acceleration, etc., can easily surpass fuel vehicles, more than 300,000 cars, and 100 km acceleration has reached the level of the past million-level supercar.
Zhang Xiang, a senior automotive industry analyst, said to Shentu that after years of competition, the homogenization of BMW and Mercedes-Benz products in fuel vehicles is very serious, and what plays a role in sales changes is often not technology, but marketing strategies. BMW is younger than Mercedes-Benz in design, which is helpful for BMW to seize the future of young users.
In such a situation, what else can Mercedes do to maintain his luxury label? In any case, the price must be "luxurious".
BMW and Mercedes-Benz each had a volume model last year - Mercedes-Benz EQC and BMW iX3. The Mercedes-Benz EQC is priced at 49.98-57.98 million yuan, while the BMW iX3 is 39.99-43.99 million yuan.
In addition, they each came up with a flagship product, representing the highest level of electrification at present. BMW is an iX, priced at the highest price of 996,900 yuan. Mercedes-Benz is EQS, with a maximum price of 1.5186 million yuan, and the starting price even exceeds the Porsche Taycan.
This price gap gives the most intuitive feeling to the electric vehicle market that Mercedes-Benz seems to be more high-end than BMW.
The difference in strategy between Mercedes-Benz and BMW can also be seen from the product pricing. BMW wants to sell, Mercedes-Benz wants luxury, which is fully reflected in the planning. When it comes to the next five-year plan, BMW frequently mentions sales targets, such as the cumulative sales of pure electric vehicles to 2 million in 2025. Mercedes-Benz is more about the brand goal, according to Mercedes-Benz, "Mercedes-Benz will also be gradually upgraded to an ultra-luxurious brand, we hope that Mercedes-Benz is higher than competitors in the brand." ”
Who can fight more with electric cars, Mercedes-Benz and BMW?
Both Mercedes-Benz and BMW know that there is no point in talking about the competitive landscape in the current market, because the future belongs to electric vehicles. So they are all actively undergoing electrification.
The transformation of Mercedes-Benz is actually not late at all, but it is less sincere and has taken many detours.
As early as 12 years ago, Mercedes-Benz launched a new energy vehicle, which was S-class as soon as it appeared, with a price of more than one million. This is very much in line with Mercedes-Benz's brand strategy of playing from high to low. However, this car was discontinued not long after its launch, and in addition to leaving jokes of "changing a battery for 170,000" and "saving all the maintenance experience", it did not set off much in the industry.
Later, Mercedes-Benz launched two new energy models priced at more than one million, an S-class and a GLE, but they did not sell much before they stopped production. After this, Mercedes-Benz also tossed C-class and E-class new energy vehicles, and the E-class pulled the price down to the level of C-class, and sales barely improved. But compared with the current new energy vehicles, it is still not at one level.
In contrast, BMW is more grounded. The i3, its first pure electric vehicle, which went public in 2014, has been sold for 8 years, selling 30,000 units in the first year and about 200,000 units so far. However, the car will be discontinued from July this year.
In addition to this car, in the exploration of other models, BMW and Mercedes-Benz can be described as half a pound. The price of 1.8 million plug-and-mix supercar i8, basically has also been discontinued, 5 series of new energy, 7 series of new energy, X1 new energy, X5 new energy and other models, stopped selling a lot, no explosive models.
The electrification transformation of Mercedes-Benz and BMW is starting to be a bit of a head start in 2021. This year, Mercedes-Benz's EQ series and BMW's iX3 have begun to rise.
The EQ series is a new pure electric brand specially launched by Mercedes-Benz. The first car in the series to be mass-produced is the EQC, which is the fist product of Mercedes-Benz's transformation into electrification in the past two years.
EQC Source / @Mercedes-Benz
However, the market has a lot of doubts about this car. First of all, it was not developed by the Mercedes-Benz pure electric platform, but the product of oil to electricity, which caused it to look particularly like the oil car GLC. In addition, there are many quality problems in the early delivery of vehicles, and the most feedback from car owners is frequent motor failures, which also triggers collective rights protection.
EQC now sells only a few hundred vehicles a month in China, and only sells more than 6,000 units in 2021, which is completely incomparable with the new car-making forces. After EQC, EQB and EQA delivered domestically, sales were even more dismal.
So until now, Mercedes-Benz has not had an electric car that can really get its hands on products, sales, and word of mouth.
In terms of individual models, BMW is currently more capable of playing than Mercedes-Benz. BMW iX3 is one of BMW's most important pure electric models, in China than mercedes-benz EQC production and delivery, however, last year iX3 sold more than 21,000 vehicles in China, the last six months of monthly sales are basically more than 2,000 vehicles, more than Mercedes-Benz EQC.
Zhang Xiang said that in terms of electrification transformation, BMW started relatively early, has certain advantages, and its sales in the international market are also ahead of Mercedes-Benz.
Mercedes-Benz decided to go black in the high-end market. The EQS, which began to be delivered in China at the end of last year, is the top mass production electric vehicle of Mercedes-Benz at present, with full configuration and price, and will be tested by the market in 2022. In addition, EQE will also be domestically produced in 2022, and the declaration map has been exposed by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. These two cars will be mercedes-benz's most important products in 2022.
Overall, the competition between Mercedes-Benz and BMW will gradually transition from fuel vehicles to electric vehicles, and what determines the future pattern is not today's sales, but the determination and layout of electrification transformation.
*The inscription is from Mercedes-Benz and BMW official micro. At the request of the interviewees, the text is pseudonymous.